There’s a World of Diversity at Orange International Fair

Seven-year-old Ian Cuthbertson enjoyed the Orange International Street Fair on Saturday in style.

Stretched out in a large wood-sided toy wagon, he had it all: a fluffy pillow, a big bag of popcorn, T-shirts, souvenir key chains, stickers and cup holders from a local radio station. He had sampled the food, played with goats in the petting zoo, and now he was kicking back.

While his little brother Kasen, 4, sat on their father’s shoulders, Ian enjoyed having the wagon to himself. Unfazed by the crowds teeming around him, the soon-to-be second-grader from West Covina put his hands behind his head and shook his bare feet in the air to the sounds of singer and guitarist Jennifer Corday and her band on the main stage in Old Town Orange.

All around Ian the fair was in full force, from the beer garden to the face-painting booth. Raising money for the Orange High School graduation night party, PTA president Pam Hernandez painted a delicate lady bug on the cheek of Kirstin Eschbach of Corona. Meanwhile, Andrew Duff, 19, an Orange Coast College student, used broader strokes to transform 7-year-old Casey Linden’s face into a glittering Mexican flag.

Hernandez said most of her young clients this year have requested hearts and flowers. “One year a kid told me he wanted me to paint a table on his face, but we talked him out of it,” she said.

Near a stand selling Lebanese food, Yasemin Zografos was belly dancing to Arabic music. She and her husband Chris and their 3-month-old daughter Aspasia had traveled all the way from Thousand Oaks to hear one of their favorite Greek bands, Hellenic Sounds. The Zografos have come to the fair at least six years in a row.

“We go between the Greek and the Arab streets, wherever there is music,” she said, wiping the sweat from her brow.

Organized by nationality into “streets,” food booths offered Dutch, Greek, Swiss, German, Norwegian, Polynesian, Danish, All-American, Mexican, Italian, American Indian, Japanese, Arab American and Irish specialties.

And nearly every culture represented also offered a version of the standard street fair delicacy: sweet dough fried in boiling oil.

In America, they are known as funnel cakes or doughnut holes. In Mexico, churros. And at the Orange International Street Fair, they also came as loukomathes, aleskivers and oliebollens.

The booths, which raise money for charities or nonprofit organizations, range from the humble cotton candy machine to a labor-intensive beef teriyaki booth.

Before the fair closes Sunday night, more than 2,000 volunteers will work the various booths, Street Fair president Judy Sollee said. According to Sollee, the event drew record crowds Friday night. Total attendance this weekend could top last year’s estimated 650,000, Sollee said.

The fair, with 145 booths and entertainment on 10 stages, will be open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. today. Admission is free.